Maida Heatter's Book of Great Chocolate Desserts (35 page)

If you bake one sheet at a time, it should be placed on the lower rack.

These keep well but should be packed in an airtight container with wax paper between the layers.

NOTE
:
If you have any leftover cookie dough, make plain drop cookies, using a rounded teaspoonful of the dough for each cookie. Or you can stir some chopped nuts and/or raisins into it before shaping.

Whoopies

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These are chocolate drop cookies—large and cake-like—sandwiched together—with a thick layer of creamy vanilla filling. They are monster cookies for cookie monsters.

I remember them as Whoopie Pies when I was growing up and going to school in New York. My husband remembers them as Moon Pies in Texas. They were also known as Cowboy Pies, Cobs, and Devil’s Delights. But under any name all children were crazy about them.

Until recently I never thought of making them at home. This recipe gives a large yield of large cookies that take a lot of room in the kitchen while you are baking. And a lot of time, since they are baked only five at a time on each cookie sheet.

If you are looking for something for a children’s party, try these—but if the children are small you might want to cut each cookie sandwich into two or three pieces before serving. Teenagers and husbands devour them whole in no time.

3 cups sifted all-purpose flour

1½ teaspoons baking powder

1½ teaspoons baking soda

3 teaspoons cream of tartar

½ teaspoon salt

6 ounces (1½ sticks) butter

1½ teaspoons vanilla extract

1½ cups granulated sugar

2 eggs (graded large or extra-large)

½ cup plus 1 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder (preferably Dutch process)

1 cup plus 2 tablespoons milk

Adjust two racks to divide the oven into thirds and preheat oven to 375 degrees. Cut aluminum foil to fit cookie sheets (you will need six pieces of foil, or you can wipe it off and reuse it between batches).

Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cream of tartar, and salt and set aside. In the large bowl of an electric mixer cream the butter. Add the vanilla and sugar and beat to mix well. Add the eggs one at a time, scraping the bowl with a rubber spatula and beating until incorporated after each addition. On low speed add the cocoa and then the sifted dry ingredients in three additions, alternating with the milk in two additions, scraping the bowl with the spatula and beating only until smooth after each addition. (Before all the dry ingredients are added the mixture might look curdled—it’s all right.)

It is important for these cookies to be shaped evenly and as close to the same size as possible. Use a ¼-cup measuring cupful of the dough for each cookie. Use a narrow rubber spatula to fill the cup, level it off, and then to transfer the dough to the aluminum foil. Shape each mound of dough as round as possible—they will run and you want them to run into even circles. Place only five mounds of dough on one piece of foil—one in the center and one toward each corner. (During baking the cookies will spread to about 4 inches in diameter.)

Slide a cookie sheet under each piece of foil. Bake for 20 minutes, reversing the sheets top to bottom and front to back once to insure even baking. The cookies are done when they spring back very quickly and surely when lightly pressed in the center with a fingertip.

Slide the foil off the sheet and let stand for a minute or two. Then, with a wide metal spatula, loosen the cookies carefully from the foil and transfer them to large racks to cool. (The racks should be raised from the surface to make room for air to circulate underneath. Just place each rack on any right-side-up cake pan or mixing bowl.) If you don’t have enough racks, as soon as some of the cookies have cooled they may be transferred to wax paper or foil.

You will have 27 very large cookies. If they are not all the same size, pick out the ones that match each other most closely and form them into pairs—there will be one cookie left over. Now lay them out in pairs, opened, with the flat sides up.

CREAMY WHITE FILLING

⅓ cup plus 3 tablespoons sifted all-purpose flour

1½ cups milk

¾ pound (3 sticks) butter

Generous pinch of salt

1½ teaspoons vanilla extract

3¾ cups strained confectioners sugar

Place the flour in a 1-quart saucepan. Add the milk gradually, stirring with a rubber spatula. If the mixture is not smooth, strain it before cooking. Place it over moderate heat. Cook, stirring and
scraping the bottom constantly with a rubber spatula, until the mixture becomes very thick and bubbles slightly. Simmer, stirring, for about 2 minutes. If necessary, beat with a small wire whisk to make the mixture smooth.

Stir in 1 tablespoon of the butter and set the mixture aside to cool to room temperature—stir it occasionally while it is cooling.

Place the remaining butter in the large bowl of an electric mixer and beat until it is slightly softened. Add the salt, vanilla, and sugar (gradually) and beat well for about 2 minutes, scraping the bowl as necessary with a rubber spatula. Gradually, 1 large spoonful at a time, add the cooled flour and milk mixture. Then beat at high speed for a minute or two until the filling is smooth, light, and fluffy.

Now place a generous heaping tablespoonful of the filling on the center of one of each pair of the cookies—use all of the filling. With the back of the spoon spread the filling out to about ½ inch from the edges. The filling will be almost ½ inch thick. Top the filling with another cookie, flat side down. With the palm of your hand press down gently on the top cookie.

Then hold a sandwich in your hands and with your fingertips press gently all around to spread the filling almost, but not completely, to the edges.

The filled sandwiches may be layered in a large shallow box or on a large tray with wax paper or plastic wrap between the layers and over the top. (Or they may be packaged individually in cellophane or wax paper, or in plastic sandwich bags, but it is best to do this after they have been refrigerated.) Store in the refrigerator or freezer.

These may be served either cold from the refrigerator, or at room temperature. When they are cold, both the cookies and the filling will be firmer. At room temperature they will be quite soft, like the ones I used to buy.

Chocolate Oatmeal Cookies

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I have made enough varieties of chocolate oatmeal cookies (which have always intrigued me) to qualify as a self-proclaimed connoisseur of chocolate oatmeal cookies. I think these are the best of all. So does my husband, and he claims to have eaten enough varieties of chocolate oatmeal cookies to put him in the
Guinness Book of Records.

These are very oatmealy, coarse, crisp, and crunchy, with soft and chewy centers. They are east to make, and are sturdy but they must be stored airtight or they become limp.

⅔ cup sifted all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

½ teaspoon salt

¼ cup plus 1 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder (preferably Dutch process)

2⅔ ounces (5⅓ tablespoons) sweet butter

1½ teaspoons vanilla extract

1¼ cups granulated sugar

1 egg (graded large or extra-large)

⅓ cup milk

2½ cups quick-cooking (not “instant”) oatmeal (see Note)

Adjust two racks to divide the oven into thirds and preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line cookie sheets with aluminum foil and set aside.

Sift together the flour, baking powder, salt, and cocoa and set aside. In the large bowl of an electric mixer cream the butter. Add the vanilla and sugar and beat well. Add the egg and beat until smoothly mixed. On low speed add half of the dry ingredients, then the milk, and then the remaining dry ingredients, scraping the bowl with a rubber spatula and beating only until smooth after each addition. Add the oatmeal and mix until evenly incorporated.

Use a rounded tablespoonful of the dough for each cookie; they should be moderately large. Place the mounds of dough about 2½ inches apart on the foil-lined sheets.

Bake two sheets at a time, reversing the sheets top to bottom and front to back once to insure even baking. The cookies will rise as they bake and then flatten. Bake for 22 to 24 minutes until the tops of the cookies feel semi-firm to the touch. Do not underbake. These will crisp as they cool. (If you bake only one sheet at a time, bake it on the upper rack. One sheet of cookies bakes in slightly less time than two.)

Let the cookies cool for a minute or so on the foil. Then, with a wide metal spatula, transfer them to racks to finish cooling.

Store airtight. I store them in the freezer (thaw before unwrapping) to keep them as crisp as possible.

NOTE
:
I especially like Shiloh Farms rolled oats from health food stores.

Chocolate Spritz Cookies

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OOKIES

This recipe is for a cookie press, although you can shape the cookies many other ways (see directions below). They are rich, tender, fragile, and delicate.

3 ounces semisweet chocolate

½ pound (2 sticks) sweet butter

¼ teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon vanilla extract

⅔ cup granulated sugar

3 egg yolks

2½ cups sifted all-purpose flour

Adjust two racks to divide the oven into thirds and preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Place the chocolate in the top of a small double boiler over warm water on low heat. Cover and let stand until melted. Then remove the top of the double boiler and set aside, uncovered, to cool slightly.

In the large bowl of an electric mixer cream the butter. Add the salt, vanilla, and sugar and beat to mix well. Add the egg yolks and beat to mix, then the chocolate, and on low speed, gradually add the flour. Beat only to mix after each addition.

Now place the dough in a cookie press; or place as much of it as will fit at one time in a cookie press and then repeat. Shape the cookies ½ to 1 inch apart on unbuttered, unlined cookie sheets.

Or with your hands roll the dough into small balls, flatten the balls, place them on a cookie sheet, and then press with a fork to form deep ridges going in one direction. Or, instead of a fork, press with a
cookie stamp or a butter mold. Or shape the dough with butter paddles and flatten slightly. Or with your hands shape the dough into crescents and flatten slightly. Or roll the dough into long, thin tube shapes and then twist into pretzel shapes (see Note) or other curlicues. The cookies should not be more than about one-third inch thick; they may be thinner.